


Apple and Spearmint

by Agib



Series: Whumptober 2020 [15]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: (emotionally hurt), Alternate Universe, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Derek Morgan, Implied Sexual Content, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Spencer Reid Whump, Strippers & Strip Clubs, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:14:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27277813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Agib/pseuds/Agib
Summary: Rule One: Do not fall in love with men.Rule Two: Do not even entertain the notion.Rule Three: Do not let them entertain the notion.Rule Four: Do not string them along.Rule Five: Do not encourage sexual advances from men. Shut them down.Rule Six: Do not show affection.Rule Seven: Do not fantasize about other men.Rule Eight: Do not go to a strip club and fall in love.
Relationships: Derek Morgan/Spencer Reid
Series: Whumptober 2020 [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1945771
Comments: 20
Kudos: 70
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Apple and Spearmint

**Author's Note:**

> <3 for my Beta, Rose, and her Ao3: [Dilaudiddreams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dilaudiddreams/pseuds/dilaudiddreams/works)  
> And her gorgeous tumblr: [@m0rcia](https://m0rcia.tumblr.com/)

**Rule One: Do not fall in love with men.**

Derek has followed this rule since he turned thirteen, when he started seeing boys in the same light in which girls had been painted since childhood.

He did not need to fall in love with someone he would never pursue, _especially_ if it was already an unconventional and controversial love.

He’s stood under the shiny gleam of a neon lap dance sign when he inadvertently meets the love of his fucking life.

It’s not even six in the afternoon. He’s only there as a wingman for the best man of a wedding he’d been dragged along to.

The overpriced wedges he’d ordered glow under the sign too, almost as brightly as the white sparkle glinting off the large distraction that plops himself beside him on the leather couch.

The love of his fucking life is doe-eyed and long legged. He’s wearing denim cut-off bottoms that are short enough to be unfit for public eyes. His top is shredded into a crop and his lean abdomen is painful to stare at directly in the blazing strobe lights. The shirt - if you could really call it that - is smeared with the colours of lipstick shades. It complements the heated flush that sits high on his cheeks, likely makeup, but Derek has never been able to be sure.

He’s gotten used to the ‘ _thanks, honestly. I’m alright_ ,’ after only three quarters of an hour in the club. He’s prepared to do the same when he looks across from where his friend is shoving a ten into some woman’s heart-shaped garter belt.

Sunshine grin, lashes like water reeds and warm, large eyes like a deer.

**Rule Two: Do not even entertain the notion.**

The man - boy - _kid_ , really - looks like he should be wandering around a college campus looking like the lost freshman he must be.

“No, wait,” he says quickly when the boy opens his rounded, cherry lips. “Let me guess.”

He lets his eyes roam up and down the boy and taps his chin as if it’s a hard job to staple a name to the perfect figure.

“Angel something? Something Angel?” He guesses.

“If that’s what you’d like,” the boy says lowly. He folds one long, pale leg over the other and leans in closer, ignoring the impression of heterosexuality Derek has always fought to give off.

**Rule Three: Do not let _them_ entertain the notion.**

The love of his fucking life is called Pretty Boy onstage, but in confidence, Spencer.

He finds him to be a softer kind of sharp, like he would cup cheeks gently while he chewed on a lower lip. Like he’d drag his crinkled jean shorts off to reveal delicate, girlish pink lingerie.

Spencer knows Derek won’t be biting today, and he doesn’t use a retired seller’s tone with him. He simply folds his coltish limbs beneath his hips and sways closer to him on the couch.

“So,” Derek hums. “ _Spencer_ , huh?”

“Yep,” the kid says, popping his ‘p’ like an innuendo of some sort, a way to highlight the gloss on his lips.

“What are you, fifteen?” He asks, not unkindly.

The boy wrinkles his perfect nose - because it is, _perfect_ that is - in disagreement. He tucks the loose hair that curls across his jawline back behind his ears before tilting his entire head to the side, like a confused pet.

“Why do you say that?” He asks, looking down at himself. He’s flesh and bones in a chest tightening way.

“That’s a nineties name,” Derek points out.

“Oh, well,” Spencer flicks at his fingernail, a chip of lilac paint breaking off. His fingers are long and spindly. “It was actually at its peak of popularity in nineteen-ninety-eight, which would make me seven, if your theory was correct.”

Derek blinks, watching the boy babble from his curled position on the couch. His eyes catch the light when he turns his head from side to side, and he can’t tell the colour of them from the lights, but he knows they’re dark, doll-like.

“I’m from eighty-one,” Spencer answers after a long moment of information on the history of his name.

_So_ , Derek thinks. _Twenty-four, then_. He wouldn’t have expected that, twenty perhaps, but twenty-four? His innocent charm must be part of the gig.

There’s six years between them which he only accidentally works out in his own head.

“Seventy-five,” he responds. The kid grins, revealing more of his pearly whites. He has sharp canines, and Derek guesses his lack of body mass can’t be pinned on a meat-free diet of any kind.

“Six years,” Spencer says happily, a small smile still gracing his features.

Derek can see where this will be going.

**Rule Four: Do not string them along.**

“But I’m smart,” Spencer says eventually, shifting in place until he’s a pinkie length away from straddling Derek’s lap. “I know things about people,” he explains.

“Oh yeah?” He prompts with one eyebrow raised to the glowing ceiling lights.

“Yeah,” Spencer murmurs, looking him up and down, full sweep. “I already know you’re gonna decline if I bat my lashes and ask for a dance.”

Derek tilts his head, chuckles, and gives the boy a nod in approval of his prediction.

“You really know your people, pretty boy.” He says it as a moniker, not a title. He is a pretty boy, with his high cheekbones and wide, brown - he can tell now - eyes.

“Oh, I wasn’t finished,” the kid says cockily. “I’m gonna hang off your coattails and eventually _I’ll_ be having to stop _you_ from clinging, and oh, look at that,” he smiles like a brat, speaks like an ethereal being. “You’re in love.”

“Oh yeah, sure,” he plays in, “and you’ll have to hit me with the breakup speech, and we’ll both be crying -”

“You know me too well already,” the boy teases. 

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t dump someone so tuned to your innermost thoughts and feelings.”

Spencer flicks a strand of hair behind his left ear and lifts one arm in a shrug, exposing his collarbone when his tattered crop slips from his pale shoulder.

“I think I’ve made a mistake,” he drawls, his eyes shining along with the strobe lights. “Baby,” he muses, “maybe we shouldn’t do th -”

“Don’t baby me,” Derek says dramatically, picking up a wedge and using it as a pointer. “No.” The boy smiles dopily at the act, watching him eat the potato wedge slowly. “Good try,” Derek softens. “I’m not buying a dance,” he concedes.

Spencer deflates a little, but still smiles.

“You wound me.” Spencer shuffles backward, leaning against the back of the couch and inching a finger towards the loopholes of Derek’s jeans.

He’s impartial, indifferent to the finger sliding over the patterning of the denim on his thighs.

_Mostly_. 

Derek can see the best man stumbling towards the bathroom after his lap dance, likely readying himself to head out for the night.

“Hope not,” Derek says nonchalantly, “with your brain and that body -”

_That slim, haltingly gorgeous body_.

“- they’re your best assets, kid.”

He stands, tucking his wallet deeper into his pocket with a grin.

When Spencer stands - notably wearing a scuffed pair of purple chucks, and not platforms like Derek expected - Derek fumbles a little over his words. Pretty boy is his height, probably down to the inch.

Those long legs and lean torso are good for something other than what he’s employed for, then. It’s rather imposing, seeing someone so baby-faced with such a height advantage.

“Bye,” Spencer says, tinkling his fingers together in a small wave. “ _Baby_ ,” he adds.

Derek laughs, shooting him a salute and making his way into the bathroom where the best man is splashing water on his face to calm himself down.

\----

“Hey babe,” Spencer says the next week. “You’re back,” he points out with a pleased little grin hanging from his cherry-glossed lips.

“And look at that,” Derek rumbles, “you are too.”

It’s five in the afternoon on a dying Tuesday, and the club is quiet, hardly any dancers swinging their way around the poles or stage.

“Why exactly are you here?” Derek asks.

The crowd had swallowed the boy up as soon as he’d finished with Derek last week, so why he was hanging around a shift like this doesn’t make sense. He _was_ pretty and the club goers loved him.

“I’m new to this club in particular,” Spencer says idly, twirling a finger until Derek plops himself down on the leather two-seater. “Not exactly new to -” his finger dances downward and Derek tries not to choke on his own spittle when he pieces the meaning together.

**Rule Five: Do not encourage sexual advances from men. Shut them down.**

He swallows. Because Spencer isn’t - not really - but he’s got this _freckle_ right above his - and his _eyes_ \- no. Not at all.

He doesn’t close the gesture down, but he doesn’t take it and run with it, either. 

Spencer’s shirtless tonight - today, he reminds himself, there’s still sun outside. He has an itch to shrug off his jacket and drape it over the boy. He’s so sickly pale and awfully thin in a skeletal way. The shorts are shorter today, too. Derek can see the colour of the fabric beneath them and they’re obviously not lace briefs, that’s for sure.

He’s grateful he’s never been into the style Spencer wears like a model. Slutty outfit, high top chucks and too much makeup. He looks more like an ad from the nineties than a stripper.

With his hair like waves, glitter-covered, dewy eyes and red cheeks, glossy mouth all plumped and feminine. Yeah. Derek wasn’t into that style. Not at all. He didn’t have eyes for _‘pretty_.’

Pretty boy isn’t his type. Definitely not.

And he doesn’t stay for two hours despite his excuse being the best man’s forgotten coat, which was found within the first fifteen minutes.

\----

“Soooo…” Spencer drawls, a massive grin on his face, shining like the moon as he approaches.

“So?” Derek says, faux-bored.

“One of the girls gave me a little gift when I clocked out a couple nights ago…”

Derek stares out at the club with fake interest, watching a few men spread dollar bills across the stage beneath a petite girl with perky breasts. She can’t compare to the way Spencer sways his hips as he waltzes across the club to splay himself out along what’s come to be Derek’s favourite couch.

He sits so close that Derek can smell his hair. _Green apple and spearmint,_ he thinks. It mixes well with the bookshop scent the kid carried with him wherever he goes.

“An anonymous gift giver,” Spencer says happily. “I wonder.”

“I’m sure you’re pleased,” Derek says lethargically. It’s taking his entire being to not reach out and let the man tuck his head into his chest so he can smell that scent each second of every -

**Rule Six: Do not show affection**.

“Pleased?” Spencer asks stupidly. “With what - the money? Of course, I am,” he says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, which it damn well could be. Why else would someone with this much potential be in a club like this?

Spencer leans inward, his curls brushing past Derek’s shoulder and making him twitch minutely. “Enough money and I’d be pleased with almost anything.”

Derek’s chest tightens at the blatantly crude commentary.

“So, you tell me if you know anything ‘bout that,” Spencer directs, leaning back and crossing his arms. He looks even younger when he tries to play good cop. It’s not his fit.

“Nope,” Derek responds. “Though I’m sure someone with a following,” - because that’s what the crowds were, a _following_ \- “like you must get some great tips at the end of the night.”

“Oh, I do,” Spencer exclaims, “but this one was different. Four-fifty, no reason.”

“Huh,” he grunts in mock-attentiveness.

“Penny said my anon was a real chocolate Adonis type,” Spencer murmurs, his lashes fluttering kindly as he stares a hole through Derek’s face. “Probably hiding a wicked six pack,” he lists, ticking descriptors off with his fingers. “Leather jacket, shaved head, an angry smoulder for days, muscles like nobody’s busine -”

“Stop. Jesus,” he groans, rubbing a fist over his eyes.

“So, can I ask what exactly that was for?” Spencer inquires politely.

Derek wants to kick himself. If money were affection, he’d definitely broken rule six, and probably rules two and four as well.

“Not that I didn’t appreciate it,” Spencer clarifies.

Moments like these, when Spencer was a stuttery, skittish mess, when the persona he presents on stage is peeled back to reveal a scrawny, anxious man with what he expects is a boyish crush, are the best moments. 

Derek has profiled the kid enough now to know that statistics are what he uses as a crutch, or that he at least finds them fascinating.

“I don’t know,” he answers, “I guess I just read somewhere that a dancer’s time is worth three-seventy-five a minute.”

Spencer softens, then pouts.

“You didn’t get anything in return,” he points out. “You said you didn’t want me to dance for you,” he whines.

Derek thinks the pout of those heart-shaped, glossy lips would look incredibly perfect wrapped around - 

**Rule Seven: Do not fantasize about other men.**

“I didn’t want a dance,” he says firmly. “I don’t.”

**Rule Eight: Do not go to a strip club and fall in love.**

He hasn’t. That would be preposterous.

He might have. Just a _little_.

“Why not?” Spencer complains. “I’m not a bumbling fawn. I’m really good, I swear it.”

Derek doesn’t doubt that he would be.

“How ‘bout this,” Spencer says. “I’ll give you a free one, we can call it the ‘ex-boyfriend’ perk.” Derek doesn’t smile, despite the humour behind the kid bringing their banter from the first night back up again.

“I’ll give you ten bucks if you drop it,” he says instead.

Spencer slumps against the couch, crossing his arms again. 

Derek is not surprised he drops it. After all, it’s only for the money.

He pretends that revelation doesn’t sting.

\----

He keeps returning to the club, from the slow period into the bustling one.

Spencer sits with him on the leather couch, still sitting pressed against his side as though he would disintegrate if they weren’t pressed from hip to thigh.

He listens to Spencer point out the regular club-goers, the freaks. He tells him about the men who grab him by the waist and shove bills into his pants and beg him to do unspeakable things.

The way he speaks is melodic, like an angel when he sighs his name.

He does still work. He gives lap dances and goes onto the stage, always glancing towards the left where Derek sits comfortably with his own drink, trying not to step in when that flash of discomfort breaks through Spencer’s barrier. It’s rare, but it happens. At least he knows Spencer is really there, and he’s not all Pretty Boy.

When he leaves, he gives upwards of eight-hundred dollars to the doorman and tells him it’s for the boy with the chuck taylor’s and the sultry, half-lidded chocolate eyes.

The description covers half of the dancers in the club, minus the chucks, but the man knows who he’s referring to, especially with the quiet glance over his shoulder he gives.

Spencer is giving someone a dance. He doesn’t look up.

\----

On his sixth visit, Spencer smiles and saunters across the club to peck his forehead and follow him obediently to what had become their couch.

“Hey baby,” Spencer says. He had taken to the pet name since their first meeting, and only continued it.

Derek didn’t have the heart to stop breaking his rules, he simply allowed the moniker.

\----

Sadly enough, he becomes a regular. But one who shows up at one time, for one dancer, for one reason. The remainder of the dancers have ceased their come-ons each time he shakes his head and visibly struggles to pull his eyes from Spencer.

He isn’t there for the drinks or the atmosphere, and he doesn’t think he ever had been.

He’s learned more about the kid. On occasion Spencer will nudge his chin to hook over the dip of Derek’s shoulder and murmur things about a life he wished he could have.

“I want a proper apartment,” he says quietly. “And a real job. Maybe a psychologist, maybe a lecturer. I want to find the cure to schizophrenia.”

Derek learns that Spencer has a mother he loves, who often forgets his name. He learns Spencer needed the money for both his own education and her full-time care at a sanatorium back in Vegas.

Derek thinks he’s probably broken rule one since the moment Spencer had slipped onto the couch beside him that first night.

\----

The first time Spencer tries to kiss him, it's his own fault.

He’s drunk too much and been sitting on the leather couch for too long. His head is foggy, and his throat tastes like salt from his last shot.

Spencer is wearing another cropped shirt and tight pants that cling to his form fittingly, almost too tight. It leaves nothing to the imagination but that doesn’t stop Derek’s mind from wandering.

He’s saying things in his ear over the blare of the music.

“Wasn’t sure you’d be coming tonight,” Spencer yells. The air is thick with smoke around them, and his movement is misinterpreted. He’s shifting in place, moving sweat slickened skin across the surface of the couch’s leather coating. 

Spencer must think he was moving closer for another reason, because he leans in too, his eyes gleaming in the club’s lighting.

He’s wearing lip-gloss and his hair smells like acai tonight. His nails are fluorescent pink and the blacklight picks them up as it swings across the space along with the rest.

His movement sticks out between them, unnatural and stiff when Derek leans back, opening his mouth to explain _uh, I’m not_ \- 

But he’s already inadvertently given Spencer the wrong idea because he presses forward and touches their lips together, the barest skim of skin against skin.

Derek flinches backward, raising his elbow up in defence. The threat is so apparent that a few of the security men step forward in preparation before Spencer waves them off.

“He’s a regular,” Spencer affirms. “I just -” he sighs, looking towards their laps. “Just made a bad move.”

It’s an instantaneous thing, the regret. It scrapes at his insides and hollows out his skull entirely. But the moment of _maybe_ , _just maybe_ , leaves him wanting more.

He reaches out, planning to manoeuvre the boy back into his rightful place smoothed against his side and the couch, but he knows the rules. Both club rules and self-imposed ones:

Dancers touch, customers do not.

Don’t show affection. Don’t encourage sexual advances. Don’t even entertain the notion.

Spencer has this watery look in his eyes and a flush on his cheeks that is always there, like he’s prepared to look like a kicked puppy at any minute.

Derek wonders what that look would feel like in the bedroom, behind closed doors.

\----

“I didn’t - I shouldn’t have - I’m sorry,” Spencer apologises.

Derek wants to be the one to apologise, wants to tell him _it’s okay. I think I… wanted it_.

But instead he stands and leaves.

_Don’t fall in love with men. Don’t fall in love at a strip club._

He leaves the kid a thousand dollars with the tip girl and tells them it’s for the boy with the model face and porno body.

Derek doesn’t know why he believes himself when he thinks he’s followed all of his rules within the confines of this club.

\----

Guilt squirms around his gut when he doesn’t return the next week. He knows Spencer will have been waiting for him with those round, wet eyes.

He knows the poor kid perked up every time he walked through those glowing club doors like he was a safe haven, which really, he was. Spencer had spoken on this before, and Derek was very obviously his only age appropriate, non-aggressive customer who wanted time with him for more than his body.

He thinks he made a mistake, and an even bigger one by choosing not to come around again.

He can picture Spencer waiting each shift, eyes on the door, crestfallen more and more with each customer that wasn’t him.

So that picture he’s conjured is why he’s here now. His breath is stuck in his throat, hands clouded with sweat and knees wobbling as he stalks his way towards his leather couch.

A few of the other dancers approach him, as if they haven’t learned by now that he was a here-for-one-dancer kind of regular.

He’s waited fifteen minutes for the announcer to give Pretty Boy’s name when the woman he’s sure Spencer has spoken fondly of pokes her head out from behind the performers curtain and makes immediate eye contact.

“Hi,” she says. _Penny_ , his mind supplies, he had given his first wad of cash to her to give to the boy.

“Hey,” he says casually, still splayed out on the leather couch he’s come to love.

“I’m so sorry, how’re you doing?” The woman is bleach blonde and her eyes have the same teary quality to them that Spencer has, although he suspects these tears may be real with the shake in her voice.

He frowns, contemplating her words. Spencer must have spoken to her about his slip-up.

“I’m alright, thanks. Just… came to apologise,” he sighs, rubbing the back of his neck worriedly.

“Oh…?” She looks around the club, clearly not self-conscious of her unfinished outfit surrounded by her done-up peers. “You - um - you’re waiting for him?”

“... Yeah? Is that a problem?” He asks carefully, tilting his head in confusion.

“ _Honey_ ,” the woman says kindly, sadly. “You haven’t heard?”

A wreath of nerves tighten around his stomach, and he sits up straighter, his throat dry and clogged with too many questions.

“N - no I - what? Is he…?”

Penny inhales, her voice sharp and shaky with emotion. The teary look in her eye seems worse when the lights flicker past the two of them.

“He um... Spencer was mugged outside the club last Thursday.”

**Author's Note:**

> My Tumblr is [@ag-ib](https://ag-ib.tumblr.com/)
> 
> my heart goes <3<3<3 when anyone sends asks


End file.
